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Ignis Asset Management, the investment arm of insurer Phoenix Group, has sold out of the last of the four joint-venture boutiques it founded in 2005, as chief executive Chris Samuel completes the latest stage in refocusing the firm on its in-house capabilities.

Ignis, which manages £73bn mostly on behalf of its parent, said it would sell its 50% financial interest in the firm to Cartesian's partners for an "undisclosed sum". Cartesian specialises in UK equities and has about £200m under management.

Cartesian is the last of Ignis' joint-venture boutiques to be spun off. The four firms date from the asset manager's previous incarnation as Resolution Asset Management. The idea was to incentivise managers with equity stakes in the firms, whilst Ignis handled sales and operational support.

The model worked for some of the firms. Emerging markets manager Hexam Capital Partners had attracted $1bn under management by the time it went independent in 2010. European equities boutique Argonaut Capital Partners manages about £1bn, and it was spun out of Ignis over the summer. In July, it said it was recruiting a new distribution team from Neptune Asset Management.

But a multi-manager boutique, Maia Capital, was less successful in attracting new money and was wound down in 2009.

Despite surrendering control, Ignis has maintained minority stakes of about 40% in both Hexam and Argonaut. This will not be the case with Cartesian, according to fund manager Jeremy Hall, who said the firm's three partners – himself, co-manager Andrew Kelly and non-investment partner Susan Rafferty – will now take sole ownership.

Hall said: "I don't honestly know why they decided not to hold onto a stake ... from our point of view we were quite happy to gain full control of the business."

Cartesian will now take responsibility for its own operations and sales over a nine to 12-month transition period. Hall said the firm had already made one of two planned hires in operations, with dealer Andrew Norris coming across from Ignis, and would be working out a strategy for sales.

Ignis, meanwhile, said the sale would allow it to focus on promoting its internal teams for its flagship products in property, fixed income and liability-driven investment. The firm recruited high-profile institutional marketer Claude Chene a year ago as global head of distribution. He replaced former marketing chief Jonathan Polin, who was associated with the boutiques strategy.

In a statement, chief executive Chris Samuel said: "We are pleased to have agreed a structure whereby our final joint venture can move to an independent business structure. This follows Hexam and Argonaut moving to become independent standalone businesses and is in line with our strategic objective to build our own in-house capabilities.”